About This Project

Ask the Scientists

What is the context of this research?

Individuals vary in their behavior. Intuitively, we all know this. However, groups may vary in their behavior as well. In evolutionary biology, we often say that natural selection occurs at the level of the individual, because that is the unit of reproduction (meaning a group does not share one set of genetic material that is passed on to another group in the same way two parents pass on genetic material to their offspring). However, the way a group behaves can impact how natural selection works on the individuals within the group. But how? This study uses ant colonies to test this. Ant colonies are the perfect model species because 1) you can measure the behavior of individual ants within a colony, but you can 2) also measure the variation of the colony as a whole. Additionally, colonies are composed of siblings and thus share the same genes, meaning that natural selection can work at the level of the group rather than at the level of the individual. This allows us to measure exactly what role personality has across multiple levels of organization.

What is the significance of this project?

We already have a good understanding of how groups may vary in their behavior, however, we have not yet applied this knowledge to how variations in behavior scale across multiple levels of organization (e.g. cells, individuals, family groups, populations). This research will help bridge these gaps in our knowledge. I am in an excellent position to conduct this research because I have already identified a group personality in our model species and have well established methods. This research will have implications not only for behavioral ecology and evolution but has practical applications in conservation biology, invasive species biology and understanding human behavior.

What are the goals of the project?

These funds will primarily be used to buy equipment, hardware and software to conduct this research. The data we collect comes from very high definition videos and is analyzed by a computer algorithm that requires a special computer processor. With this money we can buy this processor and update the necessary software which will allow us to both get more accurate results and also do so more efficiently.